stdlib and colored output in C
CColorsStdioLibcC Problem Overview
I am making a simple application which requires colored output. How can I make my output colored like emacs and bash do?
I don't care about Windows, as my application is only for UNIX systems.
C Solutions
Solution 1 - C
All modern terminal emulators use ANSI escape codes to show colours and other things.
Don't bother with libraries, the code is really simple.
More info is here.
Example in C:
#include <stdio.h>
#define ANSI_COLOR_RED "\x1b[31m"
#define ANSI_COLOR_GREEN "\x1b[32m"
#define ANSI_COLOR_YELLOW "\x1b[33m"
#define ANSI_COLOR_BLUE "\x1b[34m"
#define ANSI_COLOR_MAGENTA "\x1b[35m"
#define ANSI_COLOR_CYAN "\x1b[36m"
#define ANSI_COLOR_RESET "\x1b[0m"
int main (int argc, char const *argv[]) {
printf(ANSI_COLOR_RED "This text is RED!" ANSI_COLOR_RESET "\n");
printf(ANSI_COLOR_GREEN "This text is GREEN!" ANSI_COLOR_RESET "\n");
printf(ANSI_COLOR_YELLOW "This text is YELLOW!" ANSI_COLOR_RESET "\n");
printf(ANSI_COLOR_BLUE "This text is BLUE!" ANSI_COLOR_RESET "\n");
printf(ANSI_COLOR_MAGENTA "This text is MAGENTA!" ANSI_COLOR_RESET "\n");
printf(ANSI_COLOR_CYAN "This text is CYAN!" ANSI_COLOR_RESET "\n");
return 0;
}
Solution 2 - C
Dealing with colour sequences can get messy and different systems might use different Colour Sequence Indicators.
I would suggest you try using ncurses. Other than colour, ncurses can do many other neat things with console UI.
Solution 3 - C
You can assign one color to every functionality to make it more useful.
#define Color_Red "\33[0:31m\\]" // Color Start
#define Color_end "\33[0m\\]" // To flush out prev settings
#define LOG_RED(X) printf("%s %s %s",Color_Red,X,Color_end)
foo()
{
LOG_RED("This is in Red Color");
}
Like wise you can select different color codes and make this more generic.
Solution 4 - C
You can output special color control codes to get colored terminal output, here's a good resource on http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/linux-programming-scripting/88-color-console.html">how to print colors.
For example:
printf("\033[22;34mHello, world!\033[0m"); // shows a blue hello world
EDIT: My original one used prompt color codes, which doesn't work :( This one does (I tested it).
Solution 5 - C
#include <stdio.h>
#define BLUE(string) "\x1b[34m" string "\x1b[0m"
#define RED(string) "\x1b[31m" string "\x1b[0m"
int main(void)
{
printf("this is " RED("red") "!\n");
// a somewhat more complex ...
printf("this is " BLUE("%s") "!\n","blue");
return 0;
}
reading Wikipedia:
- \x1b[0m resets all attributes
- \x1b[31m sets foreground color to red
- \x1b[44m would set the background to blue.
- both : \x1b[31;44m
- both but inversed : \x1b[31;44;7m
- remember to reset afterwards \x1b[0m ...
Solution 6 - C
Because you can't print a character with string formating. You can also think of adding a format with something like this
#define PRINTC(c,f,s) printf ("\033[%dm" f "\033[0m", 30 + c, s)
f
is format as in printf
PRINTC (4, "%s\n", "bar")
will print blue bar
PRINTC (1, "%d", 'a')
will print red 97
Solution 7 - C
If you use same color for whole program , you can define printf()
function.
#include<stdio.h>
#define ah_red "\e[31m"
#define printf(X) printf(ah_red "%s",X);
#int main()
{
printf("Bangladesh");
printf("\n");
return 0;
}